Postal workers rally at Thornberry's office

Protesters look to save small offices, positions

Walter Wolfram and a group of postal workers gather Tuesday at 10th Avenue and Fillmore Street, near Rep. Mac Thornberry's office, to voice their opinions and swing support for assistance for the U.S. Postal Service.

Postmaster Joan Sibley of Umbarger had a simple message Tuesday for those following efforts to save hundreds of small post offices from closure.

“Just say a prayer for us,” she said.

Hers is one of 11 Texas Panhandle offices that would be shuttered as part of nationwide cost-saving measures.

About 25 postal workers rallied Tuesday outside the Amarillo office of U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Clarendon, at the Happy State Bank building on South Fillmore Street. It was one of almost 500 Save America’s Postal Service rallies held across the country in support of House Resolution 1351, which workers said would force Congress to consider payments toward retirement accounts when it calculates the efficiency of the service.

Workers at the rally argued that the U.S. Postal Service is the only government organization that turns a profit. They said a requirement that the Postal Service prefund its retirement accounts for 75 years causes the organization to appear to be operating at a loss. Retired postal worker Joe Chiappone, a 30-year employee of the Postal Service, said the resolution would allow the agency to use billions of dollars of pension overpayments to meet its financial obligations.

The Postal Service makes payments of $5.4 billion annually to prefund retiree health benefits, the American Postal Workers Union said. Absent those funding mandates, the Postal Service would have operated at a surplus over the last four fiscal years, the union argues.

“We’ve got $60 billion we’ve prefunded into it, so it looks like a loss,” said Troy Bigham, an Amarillo postal worker leading Tuesday’s rally. “We’re asking for the money we’ve already put in.”

The union’s numbers contrast sharply with the better known picture of the Postal Service as financially struggling. The service faces a deficit of more than $8.3 billion, which Postmaster General Patrick Donahue has attributed to the increased use of email and mobile communication and a corresponding plunge in the use of traditional mail. That has led to talk of the agency shutting down as early as next summer unless it closes thousands of offices and dramatically reduces its workforce of 560,000.

While they support HR 1351, postal workers oppose House Resolution 2309, which would close offices, consolidate mail plants and reduce delivery to five days a week.

Officials earlier this year said 3,700 post offices, including 222 in Texas, are being studied to see if closing them would save money.

“Obviously it’ll cut costs,” said Sam Bolen, a U.S. Postal Service spokesman.

“It’s cheaper to serve customers with a rural or highway contract carrier than (to) maintain a brick-and-mortar facility.”

Bolen said officials would like communities affected by closures to accept a retail- operated option. “Village post offices” would be operated by local businesses such as pharmacies, grocery stores and other retailers and would offer popular postal products and services such as stamps and flat-rate packaging, the service’s website said.

Providing postal service to voters is a constitutional responsibility, Thornberry said in a statement.

“It is frustrating that the Postal Service’s best idea to cut costs is to cut service, particularly in areas like ours where the post offices are an essential part of the community,” Thornberry said. “I continue to strongly encourage (Postal Service) management to look at other ways to reduce its deficit.”